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Produce => Non Edible Plants => Topic started by: aquilegia on March 16, 2004, 16:12:54
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OK, so I'm jumping the gun a little bit here but...
I now have 11 varieties of aquilegia seeds germinating away (I hope!) So in two years time when they flower I'm hoping they will be randomly cross pollinated. In another two years, when those seeds have turned into plants which have flowered (hence the gun jumping!) will they be bizarre and unusual new varieties that I can name myself. Or will they be the same as either of the parent plants?
If I pick one seed pod off a plant and sow all the seeds from that, will all the subsequent plants be of the same variety or might they vary?
I'm just far too impatient to wait four years to see for myself! ;D
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In my esperience will always cross pollinate an u def can't call em Aqui! However will give u years of pleasure. If want to cross pollinate have to take seriously an do what real aqui growers do! Soz, didn't mean to put damper on process :(
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me take something seriously - don't be silly. Years of pleasure is all I'm after - the naming bit was just me being daft (although I may still secretly name them, just not tell anyone about it!)
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Hi Aquilegia. From someone who grows dozens of different varieities I can tell you it is very difficult not to have them cross pollinate. They are sooo promiscuous :P Even from one plant you will get various different types. Why dont you give them all names instead like fred, george, mary ;)
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Theres just no escaping some people,where will you track me to next Psilo. ;D
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Most of them will undoubtedly cross, although if you grow them in `type` groups, most of the seedlings will resemble their parents simply because most of the pollination will take place between plants of the same type. What you eventually get will depend entirely on which particular genes are most dominant in any parrticular type, and quite a lot will probably be rubbish from the growers`point of view.
However, beware if you have any of the old fashioned non-spurred cottage garden varieties. Being much closer to the species their genes will tend to predominate in the offspring of any plant which they pollinate and you will find that spurs tend to diminish or even disappear, although seedlings of the cottage garden plants which have been cross pollinated by newer hybrids can show some startling and charming variations in both form and colour of the blooms - I have some in shades of deep red and blue with so many rows of petals that they are virtually miniature pompoms
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I've been told that eventually the offspring end up purple - maybe because purple genes are stronger?
Ten x
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No, Tenuse, that is not strictly correct. There is a strain of the non-spurred columbines which is dark blue, and which will come more or less true from seed - colours vary slightly in the dark blue/dark purple/almost black range, and some will produce double, triple or even quadruple rows of petals - but the more common `cottage garden` types are predominantly in shades of white through the pink shades to dark pink, and it is to these shades that the products of repeated cross fertilization usually tend. Even where I have grown the dark blue variety among the `cottage garden` types, the progeny have always tended towards the white/pink shades, so either these are the dominant colours or (quite possibly) the two varieties simply don`t hybridise.
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:D fantastic! I shall just have to try to remain patient for the next four years! (Especially as the first seeds haven't even germinated yet!)
I shall have to bin/give away any that are white or pink as these are my least favourites colours! (Mum and Mum-in-law both love white, though!)
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Aquilegia, do you have the self-coloured dark blue strain (I called them non-spurred, but technically they are very short spurred)? If not, and you would like some seed, please let me know and I will try to remember to save some - can`t promise an actual shade but dark blue/dark purple/almost black.
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Hugh - no I don't have any. Would very much appreciate it if you could save me some. What do you want to swap for? :-*
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Sorry Aquilegia, my garden is now so overpopulated that there`s no room for fresh imports unless I start digging up the lawns, but thank you for the thought.
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We have loads of self grown aquilegias in our garden. Too many in fact (- sorry aqui many get pulled as weeds!) they are continualy cross pollenating, to produce colours ranging from light pink to deep purple. I have been lucky enough to get a couple of near perfect white ones appear, plus another apparently a cross between a spurred hybrid (Mckanna hybrids i think they are called) and a common naturalised one.
Never actualy tried breeding any or even actively saving and sowing seeds. Nature just does it herself! ;D
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As a Newby to this site I'm a bit in awe of all the expertise but despite the embarrassment :-[ here goes.
I've never grown Aquilegia before, bought two packets one pink one blue double flowered, instruction says to sow and put in fridge for up to 33 days and on mentioning this to other lottie holders they thought this hilarious as a few have them growing rampantly from self seeding!
No sign yet of germination - will it happen it's been over 20 now??
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Welcome onboard Wicker!
I find aquilegia takes months to germinate. I sowed my first batch last year and was about to throw the lot on the compost heap when I finally noticed it germinated.
It does need a period of chilling so when it gets warmer it knows spring is on the way and it's time to germinate. The putting in the fridge replecates the winter.
Naturally, aquilegia sows itself in the autumn, lies about all winter and then germinates in spring - hence why all the other lottie holders have it growing like weeds.
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I don't grow them personally, so I'm not sure why, as I've been tidying through the garden borders, I'm finding hundreds of them! They are so beautiful that as I find them I'm moving them to a new bed in the back garden next to where we sit. I've got about 20 so far just through weeding round the garden! Any thoughts as to what plants would look particularly good with them?
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Ceri - I think they look good infront of tall, spiky things like delphiniums. I also really like them on mass. Well I would, wouldn't I!
I had two plants last year (yes, only two). Only one was old enough to flower, now I have at least five. One of them even looks like it's already in bud. I can't wait to see what colour it is!
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I've got about 30 sitting in pots which I grew from seeds two years ago after I put them in the fridge!
They were Alan Titchmarsh's double flowered variety - so it should be interresting to see what colours they are when they flower.
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Thanks for the reply Aqui, will just be patient and look forward to next year.
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I have them everywhere - they even come up through my paving, but I don't mind, I do love them, delicate foliage and wonderful flowers, so fragile....and yet they are as tough as old boots! I think they look great dotted all over, as they are all self seeded they all tend to be in groups, but they are in my woodland area, where they look great with the ferns, and in with my regular perennials and bulbs and shrubs. Love 'em!
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thanks aqui, I've just sown some delph in my propogator so I'll try it
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I find them good planted en masse as ground cover. The flowers are a bonus!
They are also a good thing to plant near the front of the border as the flowers dont obscure whats planted behind, then the foliage sets off later flowering plants planted behind them.
If anyone is interested a few of mine are already starting to grow their flower stems.
Another thing, is it possible to get the common ones to repeat flower? I deadhead mine to stop them seeding but have not produced any more flowers, yet i have read it is possible to get them to repeat. If so what am i doing wrong?
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Richard - the way I understand it, you haveto cut back the entire plant to the base after it's finsihed flowering.
One of mine has buds on it too - can't wait to see what colour it is!
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Richard - the way I understand it, you haveto cut back the entire plant to the base after it's finsihed flowering.
One of mine has buds on it too - can't wait to see what colour it is!
But Aqui, that only regrenerates the foliage doesnt it? I do this every year after flowering to remove the tatty leaves, but no new flowers result from it ???
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Richard - oh drat. If that doesn't work, I have no idea.
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I tended to leave the old stalks until march before tidying up and had flowers come again but don't really know what the answer is! Maybe just patience is the answer! ;D ;D ;D
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Richard - oh drat. If that doesn't work, I have no idea.
Sorry Aqui - I assumed it had worked for you and you knew a special trick to making them flower - you being one of them and all ;) (lol ;D)
Still the cutting back still does good doesnt it - the foliage gets pretty shabby after flowering so it is worth doing.
(I suppose if you fed them with something like tomato food when cutting them back they might reflower? although i have so many i am darned if I am going th that much trouble just on the offchance!)
;D ;D ;D ;D
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Ah but Richard - you forget that I've only had a garden for two years and only had my first Aquilegia flower last year. (the slugs ate it before I could really enjoy it >:()
My obsession has grown very fast and very quick!
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Mine flower from late spring all through the summer. I think dead heading before they have a chance to set seed is key. I pick the flowers off just as they start to fade, they still may have petals on, but you know the flower is on its way out. Time consuming, but quite theraputic at the end of a sunny day, listening to the birds twittering, knowing the kids are playing in their rooms just before bed, a g&t on the garden table...the ice gently clunking......THUNK, right, back down on planet earth, dead head and water seems to keep mine going on and on. ;D
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EJ - ahhhhh - you paint a very lovely picture! big sigh! :)
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Oopsidaisy! Is that why they all spread so much! Before cutting em down, always shook the seed heads! But I have that silly habit, anything will seed head got shaken, just in case. After all, can always move em later! ::)
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I do that towards the end of the season MB. Poppies are the best, so satisfying when you shake that little pepper pots and trillions of little black seeds fly everywhere. Problem for me is I end up with them in my lawn! Oh well, I tell people I am going for that meadow trend.
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Aqui - Slugs on aquilegia? Not known them to go for them in my garden. One of the few things in the garden they DONT have a nibble at!!!!!
EJ - You may have the answer there to repeat flowering. Hadnt thought of that. Clearly you have to catch these things at the right time or they will think " oh I've flowered and made seed so i can go to sleep now" Make them think they havent made seed and they think "oh dear I lost my flowers before I could make seed, I'd better make some more flowers".
Thanks I'll try it (if I can catch them in time). :)
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I know I am resurrecting an old thread but just wanted to say that the first two of my aquilegia seeds have popped thru so, fingers crossed, the rest may follow. That was 16 March I put them in the fridge until 7 April then onto heated tray until 17 April when I put them in the heated greenhouse where they are now.
They are double frilly ones so I am keeping everything crossed that I can and still be mobile!
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Just read this thread - what have I let myself in for. I bought, for the first time, some Aquilegia Danish Dwarf seeds from T&M. I thought I was buying some neat little plants, not some labour intensive thugs. So far I have three little seedings 1 month after sowing.
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Tis funny, aquilegias grow all over my garden, even through the paving :o. If I left them to it, I would be overun by them. This year I ordered some from the RHS, sowed them, and within a week loads of little seedlings. The plan is to introduce some more unusual and thin out the 'common'. They are the least labour intensive plant in my plot.
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There are three important factors to bear in kind if you grow many different types of aquilegia. The first is that on many soils, the more sophisticated the variety the shorter lived it tends to be. Most of the long spurred varieties tend to last for 3-4 years in my garden and then disappear, while the varieties closer to the species last much longer.
The second is that (as with lupins) the nearer-species varieties will hybridise freely with the more sophisticated varieties so that seedlings from the latter usually exhibit a distinct reversion to type and will gradually take over as the finer varieties die off.
The third is that if you allow seed to set and then cut and compost the tops of the plants, most of the seeds will survive composting and come up wherever you use the compost. So unless you particularly want new seed remove the old flower heads as soon as they fade.
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Aha! Hugh that explains it! I have enough im my garden so usualy 'deadhead' after a plant has finished flowering, this in an attempt to stop self seed in about the place. However i still manage to get seedlings popping up in the strangest of places (including in between rows of raspberries). Perhaps they got there via the compost (i.e. I let the seed form THEN composted them and let the seed distribute that way).
There fore dead heading sooner (ie before seed has set) would apper to be nessesary. I guess this also means deadheading individual flowers as they fade rather than waiting for the whole flower stem to fade. Might also encourage repeat flowering (????).
On the subject of cross pollenating, allongside the common 'vulgaris' types, I also have a 'Mcanna Hybrid' aquilegia. This i have had for a few years and for a time expected it to self seed (later assumed it would not due to its hybrid nature). It apparently did not. I say apparently since about a year or so a go a 'self grown' aqui appeared which when flowering produced a similar flower the the hybrid, albeit a simpler flower but same colours, thus proving the hybrid had managed to pass some of its genes on.
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McKana hybrid Aquilegia are not true hybrids in the modern sense of the word. They were released in 1954 when truly hybridised plants were just entering horticulture so it could be the breeder was trying to attract some of the glamour.
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(http://img56.photobucket.com/albums/v172/Berghill/aquilegia.jpg)
THis IS a species and it generally comes true from seed for some reason, perhaps because it flowers on the Rock Garden before the big border ones come out. A ottonis amaliae (I think, but it may not be. Label removal company at it again).
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McKana hybrid Aquilegia are not true hybrids in the modern sense of the word. They were released in 1954 when truly hybridised plants were just entering horticulture so it could be the breeder was trying to attract some of the glamour.
Im curious John, could you enlighten us further please?
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Which part? Or both?
McKana aquilegia are not true hybrids. They have been selected in the normal fashion of plant breeding. This also applies to 'Russel' hybrid lupins (I tend to see them referred to recently as a strain, which is more accurate) and also to 'Pacific Giant' hybrid delphiniums.
The breeder trading on the word hybrid? The horticultural world is full of people with something to sell trying to associate their product with something else that is successful. Probably the most famous tomato over here is Burpees's 'Big Boy'. So what else is available that sounds similar? 'Better Boy', 'Big Girl', both available from Burpee's, last time I looked, but both with significant differences from 'Big Boy'. Marketing is the name of this game. Like the rest of the world?
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Forgot something. Referring to your comment about your hybrid aquilegia passing on some of it's genes. Some seed producers rely upon the transmission of genes from F1 hybrids into their progeny. These are referred to as F2 seeds. They are seeds from F1 plants that are open pollinated. The seedlings will, hopefully, be very close to their parents but the chances that they won't will be the same as any other seeds collected from F1's by a home gardener.
Tying that into my previous post, this is a marketing tool-'hybrid seed without the cost' is a common implication that I have seen in catalogues.
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Thanks for clearing that up for me. All this breeding lark gets me a little confused sometimes.
I take it that the fact that Mckanna aquilegias are not true hybrids explains why you can grow them from seed? I have recently received free with a magazine a packet of McKanna Hybrid seed. That is perhaps the source of the confusion.
Thanks again
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Not trying to confuse you but F1's are only produced by seed unless the plants are subsequently propagated vegetatively. F1 hybridisation results from years of in breeding of OP plants to make sure that the genetic material is stable and then controlled cross pollination (by removing half the reproductive organs of each parent) takes place between two selected parent lines.
Aquilegia McKana hybrids will have been developed from years of rigourous selection of parent plants to achieve the desired characteristics and achieve stability. Because of the promiscuity of Aquilegia this would be re-inforced by making sure that cross pollination couldn't occur by using a physical bariier or by spatial separation. However, they are truly OP, not hybrids.